Etymology
The English word is derived from the Greek word ἐμπάθεια (empatheia), "physical affection, passion, partiality" which comes from ἐν (en), "in, at" + πάθος (pathos), "passion" or "suffering". The term was adapted by Hermann Lotze and Robert Vischer to create the German word Einfühlung ("feeling into"), which was translated by Edward B. Titchener into the English term empathy.
Alexithymia from the Ancient Greek words λέξις (lexis) and θυμός (thumos) modified by an alpha-privative—literally "without words for emotions"—is a term to describe a state of deficiency in understanding, processing, or describing emotions in oneself.
Note that in modern Greek the word empathy (εμπάθεια) translates as "hatred" or "spitefulness" (a situation of causing passion, rather than mutual relation to one's passion); ενσυναίσθηση is the correct modern equivalent of empathy.
Read more about this topic: Empathetic
Famous quotes containing the word etymology:
“The universal principle of etymology in all languages: words are carried over from bodies and from the properties of bodies to express the things of the mind and spirit. The order of ideas must follow the order of things.”
—Giambattista Vico (1688–1744)
“Semantically, taste is rich and confusing, its etymology as odd and interesting as that of “style.” But while style—deriving from the stylus or pointed rod which Roman scribes used to make marks on wax tablets—suggests activity, taste is more passive.... Etymologically, the word we use derives from the Old French, meaning touch or feel, a sense that is preserved in the current Italian word for a keyboard, tastiera.”
—Stephen Bayley, British historian, art critic. “Taste: The Story of an Idea,” Taste: The Secret Meaning of Things, Random House (1991)